Archive - Jun 2012

S&P 500 e-mini futures are over 20pts below their day-session closing highs on Friday as energy and financials lead the plunge. The major financials appear to have finally woken up to the hypothecated reality of huge collateral calls on the back of their downgrades, the lack of a simple debt mutualization burden-sharing pile-on to Germany, and now Italian banks asking for a bailout from the ECB; with Citi and BofA  down almost 7% from pre-downgrades and JPM/MS/GS all down around 5%. VIX has extended its after-hours spike in futures from Friday and trades back above 21% (up almost 3 vols from day-session close). With oil tumbling once again and Treasury yields giving all of Friday's rise back, risk assets in general are leading stocks lower and as we opened this morning, ES snapped down to converge with CONTEXT. Gold and Silver are sideways as Copper and Oil fall while USD pushes higher still on EUR weakness below 1.25 (and only JPY stronger among the majors as carry gets unwound in a hurry). Not pretty. Spanish and Italian bank stocks (and credit) are being crushed/halted and Spanish 10Y yields are back over 6.50% (and spreads over 500bps).

6 days... and counting.

“Greece is like a Rice Crispies Square. She’s snapped, crackled and now I am waiting for the final pop.”

The new Greek Prime Minister had an eye surgery and cannot attend the EU summit meeting. The new Greek Finance Minister became ill and cannot attend the EU summit meeting. Both a tragic turns of events; we are sure. Both coincidental you may think; but not us. Perhaps upon ascending to power and examining the books they have found that everything was not exactly, how shall we say this; Kosher comes to mind. Perhaps the records indicated a far more serious excursion from the facts than previously thought. The Germany Finance Minister came just about right out and said, “no more money.” Nothing of significance will happen in the European Union unless Germany approves it. (Please repeat this five times and write it on your whiteboard if necessary.)

In about an hour, the US Supreme Court, three years after Chrysler, is about to have a profound impact on Wall Street one more time. As Goldman explains, the court is expected to release some of the final opinions of the current session, which ends this week. Rulings on the Affordable Care Act (ACA) as well as the Arizona immigration law are likely to capture the greatest amount of attention. With a number of opinions to get out, it is possible the court could wait until later this week (possibly Thursday, June 28) to release some of the remaining rulings for this term, though the court has not yet announced any additional dates for the release of opinions. Trading in the online prediction market intrade.com implies a 74% probability that the court will find the mandate unconstitutional; prior to the oral arguments in March, it implied only around a 35% probability the court would rule against the mandate. Goldman believes that the outcome is fairly unpredictable and that many market participants probably are relying too heavily on the oral arguments in trying to predict the outcome of the case.

UPDATE: Nowotny just confirmed ECB's lack of confidence in the EU Summit and stomped on Greece's hopes for negotiation.

*NOWOTNY SAYS GREEK TALKS CAN'T START WITH WISH FOR MORE TIME

As we noted over the weekend, there really is only one voice on which to act in Europe (and plenty of noise that should be ignored) and that is Germany. This morning we already heard from Herr Schaeuble and Herr Siebert, but Frau Merkel has just come over the top with her hope-crushing reality all over again.

It would appear that for once just talking about a potential solution and throwing larger and larger completely unfounded and intangible numbers around as evidence of a 'grand plan' is not going to work as Spain officially requests its bailout. However, just as we noted last week (and suggested as the next macro trade to watch), the bailout will come with strings attached; and perhaps, just perhaps, that is why Spanish bank subordinated credit spreads are deteriorating so rapidly this morning. Our call for a 'bail-in' type solution that crams sub and some senior debt is not only causing Spanish banks to blow wider but also spreading into the Subordinated debt of Italian banks as traders scramble to protect those 'juicy' yields which now seem a little more worrisome given their position on the capital structure. The more liquid Senior and Subordinated credit indices have decompressed around 6bps this morning to a 177bps spread differential (as Subs trade 15bps wider at 465bps on average) and remains the 'easiest' way to position for a 'bail-in'. We also note that the LTRO Stigma (the spread between LTRO-encumbered and non-encumbered bank spreads) has blown back to near-record wides in the last few days.

Or is it Red-Ink the Bismerkel?

That the most important man in Europe is actually a woman is now understood by everyone. Yet behind even Merkel, sits another man: German finance minister Wolfgang Schäuble, who is truly the devious mastermind behind the European endspiel, in charge of playing it in a way that benefits Germany uber alles. Which is why what Schäuble says, unlike anything uttered by Europe's "beggar" states, is actually important. Today, he speaks with Spiegel magazine and discusses, among many other things, the topic that is the most sensitive for the rest of Europe, and which must be overcome if a united Europe is to work: the abdication of national sovereignty, and implicitly the accession of Germany to the head of the European pyramid. That this will never happen is precisely why the European experiment is ultimately doomed, but of course they can keep trying, and in the process transfer as much wealth as possible to the only beneficiary from an imploding EUR. Wild guess who that is... Because at the end of the day, it appears that Schäuble is just as wily as America's own Rahm Emanuel: "SPIEGEL: With all due respect to your vision, is there truly more willingness today among EU member states to give up sovereignty than there was in the 1990s? Schäuble: The recognition that this is necessary, and the willingness to do so, has certainly grown due to the crisis, and not just in Germany. I would much prefer that we not have so many crises, and particularly not such severe ones. But every crisis also includes the opportunity to recognize what is necessary [regarding European sovereignty]. That's what led to the fiscal pact, in which 25 EU countries pledged to improve their fiscal discipline. And that's also how the new Europe will come about." Is it finally becoming clear to even the most inept financial journalists what the German endgame is?

Nearly two weeks ago we penned "These Three Spanish Banks Will Be Downgraded Tomorrow" which showed which banks had a rating higher than the sovereign following Moody's long overdue Spanish downgrade, and thus were about to be downgraded by many notches. Today, after a ridiculously long delay whose only purpose was to buy time, Moody's is about to junk virtually the entire Spanish banking sector, as was widely expected.The downgrade is expected to happen within hours.

Last week, Europe was the source of transitory euphoria on some inexplicable assumption that just because the continent has run out of assets, and the ECB has no choice but to expand "eligible" collateral to include, well, everything, things are fixed and it is safe to buy. Today, it is the opposite. Go figure. Call it pre-eurosummit burnout, call it profit taking on hope and prayer, call it Brian Sack packing up his trading desk (just 5 more days to go), and handing over proper capital markets functioning to a B-grade economist, or best just call it deja vu all over again.

Remember those promises about an unconditional Spanish bailout?

• JUNCKER SAYS CONDITIONS OF AID FOR SPAIN WILL INCLUDE RESTRUCTURING PLANS

Cue #RajoyCobarde all over again, as Spain is now officially a vassal state of the EU, which in turn is an indentured slave of Germany.

• Merkel Backs Debt Sharing in Germany Amid Closer EU Push (Bloomberg)
• With a ruling as early as today, here are four health care questions the Supreme Court is asking (CBS)
• George Soros - Germany’s Reticence to Agree Threatens European Stability (FT)
• China Stocks Drop to Five-Month Low (Bloomberg)
• The New Republic of Porn (Bloomberg)
• That's a costly detached retina: Greek Lenders Postpone Mission to Athens (FT)
• Spain Asks for Aid as EU Fights Debt Crisis (FT)
• Wolfgang Münchau - Why Mario Monti Needs to Speak Truth to Power (FT)
• U.S. Banks Aren’t Nearly Ready for Coming European Crisis (Bloomberg)
• MPC Member Wants £50bn Easing (FT)
• India Boosts Foreign Debt Ceiling by $5 Billion to Defend Rupee (Bloomberg)

Goldman recaps the past tumultuous week, and looks at events in the next 7 days, of which the key feature will be the next "latest and greatest" and most disappointing European summit on Thursday and Friday, where not even Greece is going any longer, and which not even the most resolute Europhiles expect to resolve anything: "The key event of next week is the EU summit. The latest European Economics Analyst details our expectations. In brief we expect to see finalization of the much-anticipated growth compact, involving financing for infrastructure investment and a restatement of the agenda for structural reform. We also expect announcement of a plan for ‘banking union’ in the Euro area, even if, owing to unresolved political differences, details are likely to remain sketchy on key issues—notably on how the implicit cost of providing fiscal backing for the Euro area banking system will be shared across countries."

While the world has known for over two weeks that the Spanish banking system is insolvent and locked out of global liquidity, the country was reticent about formally bowing down to Germany and announcing in proper protocol that it was broke. Until a few hours ago, when Spain's Economy Minister Luis de Guindos Monday sent a letter to Eurogroup President Jean-Claude Juncker, as expected, formally requesting aid to assist with the recapitalization of Spanish banks that need it, the ministry said in a statement. Sadly, at this point we can all just sit back and await for the next Spanish bailout letter demanding more cash, because, as we have explained on several occasions, the ultimate funding need of Spanish banks will be well over €100 billion, as further confirmed overnight by another analysis from Open Europe, which notes the patenly obvious: "Up to mid-2015 Spain faces funding needs of €547.5bn, over half its GDP and a large majority of its debt."